Magnet for War
by This Earth is Tainted
Summary: Join David Gunner, the 'Sole Survivor', as he murders in self-defense, contemplates on his past, murders in self-defense, feeds his dog, and murders in defense of others. Gunner is a simple man. A simple, broken man. What else would one expect from a man whose lost it all?


The barking of gunfire was his first introduction to the day as he started from sleep. The barking of his dog was the second. He'd nearly hit the mutt when he leaped out of bed in alarm, gun in hand. There were screams sounding from outside, some of pain, and others that consisted of . . .

"I'm gonna tear you the hell apart when we get in there, fucker!"

They were either raiders, or a bunch of scavengers that didn't heed his sentry-bot's warning to stay away. Either way, the fact that they were still alive for longer than thirty seconds after his awakening meant that they had pulse-weapons of some kind. If that was truly the case, his turrets were liable to fall next. He made his way from the garage of the station to the front entrance and peered through the window.

Yep, he confirmed. His dull-green sentry-bot was inactive while his turrets' rate of fire were now dying down. There were eight of them, three already downed and bleeding, and the other five taking cover behind the trees across the road. He looked on as they all shot at his two remaining turrets. It had taken no less than ten seconds for the things to fail. The maintenance for all this would be grueling.

One of the five immediately withdrew from cover, going into a full-on sprint towards the gas-station. Not even adrenaline would make someone that eager, he noted. The man must've taken some rage chem for a little courage before this.

"You're gonna fucking die in—"

The man's charge was stopped as his left leg gave in under itself. He hadn't even felt the sniper round impact his knee. So he _had_ taken chems, probably psycho, as only something that potent could make you numb to such pain.

The other four had now drawn their own crudely-made pipe rifles and began shooting at different areas of the station.

"The bastard's over there, behind the generator!"

"No, you idiot, he's right behind that bush!"

"Wha— that ain't even close, dumbass!"

The arguing pair had fallen seconds later, heads punched through like holes in cans. The following scream was one of disgust, a bit of brain seemingly striking one of the others. The woman stumbled from behind the tree, the ringing of her ears the only indication of the foolishness of such a decision. She collapsed a moment later, bright, red blood pouring from her temples like cascades.

An audible scoff came from one of the remaining.

"Squeamish little shits, all of you! I never should'a joined up with you amateurs!"

The man looked around, suddenly realizing just how dark it was without the shooting. The clouds blocking the moonlight was no remedy for that either. Slight panic soon beset him.

"Hey. Hey! You out there, man?" He called out, receiving nothing but the crackle of leaves as his response, but even that set the man on edge.

It was then that something ran into his leg, knocking him down and making his gun slip from his grip. The sky allowed a bit of light to illuminate the trees, just enough for him to see what it was. Before him stood a growling dog, teeth sharp as razors. He reached for his rifle before realizing he'd lost it, and the sky decided that then was the moment he didn't need the light.

The only sound that came from him was a gargled scream as his throat was promptly torn out by the mutt, and the last noise he heard before darkness took him was a monotone . . .

"Good dog."

The man watched as the last raider died, patting his dog's head for a good job. He then looked across the road towards his home — a Red Rocket gas station. Well, it was a gas station prior to the Great War, but now the building served as nothing but shelter. The turrets in front of the home were dented and damned near burning, and the security robot he'd built was completely still and would need repairs lasting two days before it would work again, and there lay eight grisly-corpses in various places around the road and behind the trees.

He looked back to his dog, which was now staring up at him curiously. He looked at the Pip-Boy around his forearm for the time: 5:00 AM. And with that, a rough sigh tore itself from his throat as he lowered his arm and massaged his temples.

"I need to move."

And he walked back to the garage.

* * *

"You look like you need coffee." was something he had gotten too used to hearing when waking up, right behind the sound of machine guns with the occasional explosion or two. Those were things he'd just come to expect. It was in the absence of those things, however, that unease would take hold of him. That was the only reason he considered being attacked by a raider gang a pleasant awakening.

But now he was up. Even though his eyes felt like dry wells and burned at every light he glanced at. Even though his headache made him want to pass out onto the dirty, cold concrete floor. Depriving himself of sleep was becoming a quite unhealthy habit of his, but as long as there were things to be done, sleep came last in priority.

Besides, adrenaline had a way of dispelling weariness.

First, I need to repair the turrets, restock 'em while I'm at it too. Then I need to see if Manny's fusion cores need replacing—those damn pulse grenades probably jacked those up. Food supply's running a little low too, might need to go to the city . . . he mentally listed off things that needed doing.

He looked at his Pip-Boy: 5:58. A small whine then gained his attention, and he gazed down to see his German Shepherd staring up at him.

"What do you think, Dogmeat," he spoke in a soft tone he reserved for the dog, and no one but the dog. "Think we should visit Diamond City for a bit?"

He received a happy bark in response.

"Alright. To the old ball game it is, then."

Dogmeat gave something akin to a nod and waltzed back to its shabby doghouse to wait for their embarking. He watched the little thing go before turning back to his workstation and grabbing his toolbox. It was time for maintenance.

The 'fun' part of engineering.

* * *

The building looks real drab today, he thought. Maybe the recent chain of harsh weather had begun to finally wear down the paint, maybe it was just the rain that made everything look depressing, even moreso than things already looked. He didn't know, but whatever it was had put him in a bad mood, and he made sure everyone around him knew it.

He defecated on their newest member's sleeping-bag, he'd pushed the table over when the rest of his gang were playing _Caravan_ , and he made sure to take all the caps off the four scavengers they ambushed earlier—490 in total.

All in all, being an insufferable "dickhead," as one of the others put it, was actually lightening up his day. Funny that.

So one could imagine how ecstatic he'd gotten when he spotted a well-geared scavver crouched over one of the four he'd killed. The man was wearing no headgear at all, and the fool had his back turned to him. "Too fucking easy," he muttered to himself before he raised his machete and silently neared the man. And right when he was about to bring it down on the man's neck . . .

"Right."

He hadn't the time to even utter a word of surprise as the machete was ripped out from his hands and the corner of the brick building beside him was the only thing he could see.

"Too fucking easy."

And he saw red before seeing black. The pain was great, but after two more impacts against the bricks, he wasn't feeling much of anything. Before his mind went silent, though, he heard what sounded a lot like a dog.

Said dog was now licking his crimson remains.

"Hm? Hey, quit that shit!" The attacker, hands now slightly splattered with blood, shouted down the mutt's behavior. Accompanied by the ashamed whine was a prompt "What was that?"

He grabbed a revolver from his belt and repressed a sigh. Several alert raiders had already spilled onto the streets to investigate. Five raiders. His hand was already up, pressing the trigger before he was even done counting. He cocked the hammer before firing the second shot. The first bullet struck a man in the neck, the second found itself through the artery in another's leg.

Two shots fired in one second, and in the next, he threw down a fragmentation mine. He then turned to run through the alleyway behind him. Doing so would allow him to make his way behind the other three raiders, all of whom had now begun shooting at his last position.

In eight seconds, he made his way behind the group. They had seen the mine and stopped at least two feet from the device.

"Where the fuck'd he go?"

He shot the mine between them all. The furthest one standing from the thing was the only one still whole after its fragmentation. He wasted no time in marching towards the downed woman. She moaned, pained, against the ground before being jerked up by her tattered leather jacket.

Any pleas or swears that she wanted to scream were clearly not wanted by this man, whoever he was. His expression was stoic—not angry or sadistic. Just stoic. Like this was just routine to him. His eyes seemed to say the same, but they held a hint of something else. Disgust, maybe it was?

Staring at the man, she had nearly missed the gleaming combat knife he'd brought against her skin with his free hand. She felt the liquid run from her neck as he dragged the cold blade down the side of it. She shut her eyes and grunted, trying to push down a loud cry, but ss she did so, the pain only increased.

"Look at me."

She did just that.

"How many of you are there?"

The eyes combined with the deep, gravelly voice and the razors of the knife at her throat that only dug deeper with each passing second . . . It was all too much for her. Her eyes started to water. It seemed like she was going to cry. The knife only cut deeper.

"Answer my fucking question—"

"There's seven of us! Seven!"

He drew the knife back. "Not anymore, there ain't." Before he stabbed, however, he ran the number through his head. Seven raiders.

A massive, sudden pain exploded through his head at the realization. He tried to stop his roll across the ground. His ears were ringing, and every color now showed itself in separate floating blots that encompassed his entire vision. If his eyes, ears, and nose weren't all bleeding, he'd be shocked. To his side, he felt Dogmeat pushing against him, trying to help him up.

In the next moment, after going thoughtless from sheer pain, there came another giant pain that radiated through his ribs. That seemed to bring him back to his senses. He realized that he was rolling again, now more than ten feet away from where he was before.

"What," he managed while coughing up blood, "the hell just happened?"

He looked up to see a man in power armor, the metal plate all crudely made and pieced together to form something just functional enough to work. In between the man's hands lay a super-sledge. The man walked towards him, laughing.

"Holy shit," he yelled. "Just like kickball!"

He tried to stand up before the raider kicked him again. He heard the sound before the pain. The loud metallic noise that echoed in his ears signaled that he had failed his task. Blood erupted from his throat when he landed again.

"Wait a second, kickball. You're that guy in the papers, ain't you? Something 'Gunner', right? Man outta time."

He drew a stimpak from his belt while the raider talked.

"Well, shit, I'd say you were outta time, alright!" The man brought down the sledgehammer.

He rolled away the second the hammer met the ground. Before the other man could react, he darted behind him and grabbed onto the suit's valve, eliciting a very unsatisfied string of curses from the raider.

"Damn, why'd you move—"

The air releasing from the suit after he'd turned the wheel interrupted him. The back of the armor was promptly opened, and the man inside was grabbed by the back of his shirt and thrown onto the cracked road.

He turned to the raider, stimpak in hand.

The other man looked up at him.

"Hold on, wait!"

He didn't wait. He raised and plunged the stimpak into the man's neck. Watching as the red liquid emptied into him, he then withdrew it. The syringe, now devoid of its contents, could no longer heal its own injection point. He looked back to the raider and aimed a hard kick towards his jaw.

Once the raider fell onto his back, he crouched over the man and grabbed onto his neck. His other hand—still clutching the empty stimpak—raised the syringe over the man's throat. Anything the raider had tried to say was cut short as the stimpak pierced through the soft tissue in the middle of his collarbone. He was stabbed once, twice, then four times. All until his pulsed stopped.

He stood up, breathing heavily, then looked around to find that the other raider had been long gone. He went to wipe the sweat from his forehead, but realized that he would smear more blood onto his face if he did. He wished it was still raining.

A light patter behind him gained his attention. Dogmeat was now staring up at him.

"You, uh, still wanna go to Diamond City, boy?"

He received a happy bark in response.

* * *

 **Hello, person reading this. Just thought you should know, this is my first story here. Is it bad. is it good? Any tips or nitpicks? Just fuck my shit up, fam. Hurt me plenty.**


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